From The Desk – Carlos Cortes, Mark Vientos, Pete Alonso, Betting on Spring Games, Bobby Knoop

Good morning.

14. Carlos Cortes, LF Video

Drafted: 3rd Round, 2018 from South Carolina (NYM)

Age     21.5    Height 5′ 8″    Weight            200     Bat / Thr         L / S     FV       40

Tool Grades (Present/Future)

Hit       Raw Power     Game Power  Run     Fielding          Throw

30/45       60/60                 35/55        40/40      40/45             45/45

Cortes was a bit of an oddity as a prep underclassman, a switch-thrower who played multiple positions and had elite bat control. His body went south a bit from that point and he’s lost some athleticism; he’s now a left fielder or first baseman after a stint at second base and a short-lived attempt to catch. Cortes has plus raw power and a good lefty swing with some bat control, but not as much as he used to have, and it’s further undermined by his power-based approach. He was streaky at South Carolina, getting hot in the second half of his draft year. Scouts who see him when he’s running well think he has elite offensive ability, and given the defensive and physical limitations, Cortes will have to be an elite offensive force to be more than a platoon corner bat. We’ll probably know if that’s possible in the next year or so.

Fangraphs    top 100 prospects –

            #92 – 3B Mark Vientos - Vientos is a  third base, power projection bat who had a loud statistical 2018.

Vientos got on the national scouting stage as a prep underclassman when he flashed first round tools despite being very young for his draft class, which is pretty unusual. He didn’t hit as much as expected as a senior and some scouts questioned his defensive ability, competitiveness, and feel to hit, so he slipped to the second round despite flashing big power and being 17 on draft day, something that is generally really attractive to analytically-leaning clubs. Vientos performed fine in his pro debut, but broke out in his second year, crushing the Appalachian League at age 18 in 2018. He controlled the strike zone and hit for power while exhibiting very high exit velos for someone his age.

Vientos is advanced mechanically, making him a potential 6 bat/6 power combination at maturity if he continues at this trajectory. The competitiveness that some scouts questioned showed up in 2018 when Jarred Kelenic arrived in Kingsport and became the top prospect on the team, and Ronny Mauricio, Luis Santana, and Shervyen Newton were all top 10 prospects in the system in an infield time-share with him. If the makeup has turned a corner and the hitting continues to progress, the main issue will be defensive fit. Vientos is a well below average runner who one scout described as ‘athletic from the knees up,’ to the point where the lack of quickness will limit him to being average defensively, but he’s far from that right now. One Mets source drew a parallel to Nolan Arenado‘s makeup and defensive concerns, which quickly evaporated in the upper minors as he turned into the best third baseman in baseball, but that seems unlikely at this point.

PECOTA's 2019  Breakout Bets (Hitters) –

       

PC - Ed Delany

    Pete Alonso, New York Mets

Top Three Same-Age Comps: Rhys Hoskins, Chris Carter, A.J. Reed

Alonso is a 24-year-old should-be designated hitter on an NL team that didn’t call him up last season and PECOTA isn’t sure he’ll hit .225. So why is he on this list? Here’s everyone projected for a higher isolated power than Alonso in 2019: Mike Trout, Joey Gallo, J.D. Martinez, Giancarlo Stanton, Aaron Judge. That’s it. Alonso’s skill set is riddled with red flags, but he’s hit .290/.381/.560 in three minor-league seasons, including .285/.395/.579 with 36 homers last year. He figures to arrive in New York as soon as his free agency has been delayed for another year, and PECOTA assigns Alonso the second-highest “breakout” rate (25 percent) among expected regulars. The top-comp roller-coaster of Hoskins/Carter/Reed seems perfect.

Major League Baseball   pushing to ban betting on spring training –

                       A request from Major League Baseball to gambling regulators to ban betting on spring training games was quickly rejected in Nevada and is under consideration in at least two other states that recently legalized sports betting.

The league asked for the ban on Wednesday last week -- the day before the first scheduled spring training game -- arguing in letters to regulators that the exhibition games are "more vulnerable to manipulation" because teams are focused on getting players ready for the season, not on winning. MLB said its concerns have grown because of the spread of legal sports gambling after a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court last year opened the possibility of new American markets.

The games have historically attracted little to no betting action in Nevada, where casinos in Las Vegas and elsewhere have taken bets on spring training games for decades.

Angels' Bobby Knoop   retires after 53 years in baseball

Longtime Los Angeles Angels player and coach Bobby Knoop has announced his retirement after 53 years in baseball.

Los Angeles shared the news in a release Tuesday.

The 80-year-old Knoop was one of the Angels' first recognizable figures, earning the club's MVP award four times in its inaugural decade.